Three women share their stories of struggle, and what they did to reconnect and rebuild happier marriages

Malky’s Fix

I was 23 when I met Eliyahu. Our dates were positive, and as the dating progressed, we began to share on a deeper, more personal level. Eliyahu opened up about his childhood, which was full of abuse, dysfunction, neglect, and poverty.

He had worked on himself and was determined to avoid the mistakes he’d witnessed in his parents’ home. He promised me that if anything ever came up, he’d get help. He wouldn’t let his own family have a home like that.

Eliyahu was very transparent about everything, and his openness put me at ease. If anything, it made me want to be the person in his life that would care for him in a way that no one else had until this point. I thought that maybe by marrying someone like me, who grew up in a healthy home, he’d be able to fully heal.

We married in February, and by November, I’d given birth to a preemie at just 32 weeks. That threw us for a loop. Even after my newborn son was released from the NICU, he was still a high-needs baby. I was going through a lot, and Eliyahu wasn’t helpful in the way that I needed him to be. Instead, he was focused on providing for us and was working crazy hours.

Part of growing up in poverty is the anxiety at the prospect of having to relive it. My husband always gave work his full attention and rarely said no to a job opportunity. This meant that he was frequently out of the house and busy on the phone.

Eliyahu and I came into marriage with different expectations. In my home growing up, everyone had such different schedules that it never made sense for us to have dinner together. There was food in the freezer, and everyone made whatever they wanted. My husband expected supper. I couldn’t understand what the big deal was. He kept feeling that I wasn’t doing what he needed, and he felt unloved. We had completely different love languages and ideas of what it means to love someone.